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American Falls and Aberdeen, sister cities
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Location: Blogs Jim's Blog |
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| Posted by: Jim Hansen |
7/27/2006 |
American Falls and Aberdeen became strong farming communities in an era when our government invested in communities. That investment helped level the playing field for everyone to participate, particularly family farmers and small businesses. Congress has retreated from investing in communities, preferring to subsidize big private interests instead.
I spent last Wednesday in the two communities of American Falls and Aberdeen. They are on opposite sides of the Snake River and the American Falls Reservoir and are in two different counties (Power and Bingham) but are more like sister cities, being separated by only 11 miles. Their two newspapers – the Power County Press and the Aberdeen Times – also are run by the same locally owned company.
I started my day in American Falls with a visit to City Hall where I met its dynamic new mayor, Amy Wynn. She shared many of the issues her community of 4,100 is facing. When I visited with local seniors, business people and the regulars at the lunch counter at Rockland Pharmacy, it was clear that Mayor Wynn has a lot of admirers in town.
Over the past century, the federal government invested in the big things that made agricultural communities like American Falls and Aberdeen possible: water reclamation, power production, schools and transportation. Those investments helped everyone and they created a level playing field for small businesses to compete with larger competitors. Those investments also helped the communities like American Falls and Aberdeen grow and weather the ups and downs of the economy.
Now, Congress tends to ignore the need for investments in communities, preferring instead to subsidize larger and larger corporate enterprises. Of course, that’s where Congress’ campaign contributions come from. Over time, the pressure for small businesses to shut down or move to larger cities has become stronger. When the economy weakens or things like gas prices take a spike, it's harder to recover in small communities.
American Falls is the only town in Idaho that literally picked up and moved when it became necessary to secure a better power source for the region and to improve water storage for the agricultural base that makes up that stretch of the Snake River. The big move took place in 1925-27 and the old town site is now at the bottom of American Falls Reservoir. Because there is consistent water now, the main agricultural crops in the area are potatoes and sugar beets.
Aberdeen has a much smaller population at just over 1,800. Mayor Morgan Anderson was on vacation when I stopped by, but I was able to visit briefly with Police Chief Ray Dalling. While I was in town, I also learned that the Aberdeen Arts Council is raising money to purchase a grand piano for the community. They are about a third of the way towards their goal of raising $23,000. The piano will be kept at Aberdeen Middle School and will be available for music students as well as any pianist in town to play.
This kind of local initiative to solve problems is what makes communities survive, despite the lack of investment by their own federal government.
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